What Happened to Us in Eden? - Psychology of the FallSample

FIRST AND NEXT-TO-LAST, SECOND AND LAST

If having two accounts of the same creation is already a gift, the order in which it all happened is also a gift—both for man and for woman—even though it has long been a point of controversy. Order does have meaning, of course. The question is: what does it mean, and what does it not mean? Its implications touch on identity and essence, on purpose and development, but not necessarily in the ways tradition has often interpreted it.

Let me summarize the main idea with something that, though obvious, has too often been overlooked:

• Adam was the first to be created,
• but he was also the next-to-last.

Both of these truths matter and deserve careful attention.

• That makes her the second,
• and also the last—the completion of creation.

To focus only on whichever side suits us is to use a double standard. We don’t play games with Scripture. Would we ever take a coin and claim that only one side matters? Then why do we so often do that here—from either side of the debate?

The woman’s arrival in this later order doesn’t diminish her place in creation or in relation to the man. Quite the opposite—it adds, and it adds a great deal. Why this is so often ignored is another matter altogether.

This “detail” was never meant to make woman superior, but to enrich the relationship and shape them together into one flesh. And this is not a feminist argument. We are after the truth.

God doesn’t overlook things. He didn’t “realize too late” that something was missing in His creation. He already had a plan in mind, set in His infinite wisdom before the foundation of the world, and He carried it out step by step, in the right time and order—just as He always does.

Seen this way, it almost feels as though God held back a kind of “ace up His sleeve,” a “strategic move,” a “phase two” of His plan—allowing the woman’s arrival to be delayed just a little. And in doing so, He created a particular effect in Adam, which we will look at more closely.

For now, let me leave you with this thought: how does this detail about order change your perception of Eden? And what if that order itself was a gift—bringing fresh air into our relationships?